Risen 2 - Preview Roundup # 4

Perhaps the most important of these to learn and master is the way conversations are handled and how they tie into the game's navigation. Like the majority of expansive RPGs nowadays, Risen 2 comes packed with conversation options that both progress the story/mission and offer a deeper insight into the world around you. Unlike the majority of expansive RPGs nowadays, Risen 2 does away the likes of a mini-map, in-game 'Fable-line' and other navigational aids. Therefore, it's vital that you take notice of what you're being told in conversations. When you embark on a mission NPCs will usually give you some verbal info about where to go and what to do, and that's the only hint you will get. Helpfully, conversations are recorded word for word in a tab within your inventory screen for future reference if you get lost.

It's evident that Risen 2 has numerous things to recommend it: an interesting setting, rum-soaked characters full of personality and sound RPG elements. But it really, really needs to be polished, at least on console, if it's to have any chance of appeasing frustrated fans of the first game or attract a wider audience to its lush tropical islands. It makes a lot of sense for Piranha Bytes to avoid areas that it doesn't feel it can do justice, such as sailing and ship combat, and focus instead on spinning a feisty yarn of swashbuckling and raucous bawdiness – but there's still more work to do in order to deliver on its potential. Failure to do address its technical limitations may have fans using language that would make a pirate blush.